Per Macworld, Samsung this week announced the Spinpoint M8 internal hard drive with 1TB capacity.

The drive features two 500GB platters and is 9.5-millimeter (0.37 inches) high, so the drive can fit easily into laptop storage bays. The 5400-rpm Spinpoint M8 is priced at US$129, and available in the U.S. and Europe.

Until recently, the previous top capacity had been 750GB of storage, an option offered by companies like Apple, Dell and Hewlett-Packard, which currently offers an option in which buyers can select two drives for a total of 1.5TB of storage on a notebook.

Companies such as Toshiba and Western Digital offer 1TB internal laptop drives, but top notebook makers are not yet offering 1TB drives as an option. Desktop hard drives with 1TB storage are now commonly available.

The Spinpoint M8 drive is denser than earlier models as it can store more data per unit area, Samsung said. The drive is also more power efficient as it carries fewer components like heads to seek and access data.

The disk is about 7% faster than its predecessor and uses 8% less power, Samsung said.

The drive operates on the 3gbps SATA interface and has 8MB buffer memory. It generates less noise and an overall redesign of the drive structure protects the disc from physical fracture and data loss, Samsung said.

If you’re looking for a movie ticket application that checks against your calendar and tries to find showings that are convenient for you, Apple may already be working on it.

Per AppleInsider, a patent application that went public this week proposes an idea that would link with the calendar data stored on a user’s iPhone, as well as location-based data for nearby theaters. The proposed invention was filed with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in a patent application entitled “Systems and Methods for Providing Context-Based Movie Information.”

Apple’s solution would obtain showtimes from multiple theaters, but would take care not to inundate the user with too many showtimes. Instead, movie times would be presented in time slots, and user would be presented with a series of time intervals that fit their schedule and location.

Even if a user were to manually select an unavailable time slot, the movie application could prompt the user to view information associated with a scheduled calendar event. From there, users could be presented with the option to cancel the event listed on their calendar, and the application would adjust accordingly, presenting new available showtimes.

In addition to showtimes and calendar conflicts, movie times and locations could also be recommended based on current traffic conditions. With this, users could determine which theater and showtime would be ideal after a scheduled event, like dinner at a restaurant.

Apple’s proposed iPhone software also has social elements integrated. The movie application could access a user’s list of contacts, and shared contacts would be able to see when and where their friends are seeing a movie.

Users could also choose to actively send their movie plans to friends. For example, if a calendar entry were to include the names and contact information of dinner participants, once tickets are ordered the appropriate information could be sent to those contacts.

The movie application could also include links to purchase tickets, as well as movie trailers. Apple already offers a similar set of features on its website, with movie locations and showtimes provided in an iOS-friendly HTML5 site.

Apple’s patent application, made public this week, was first filed with the USPTO in December of 2009. The proposed invention is credited to John Louch and Todd Ditchendorf.

Per Macworld, Apple has quietly updated its App Store Review Guidelines to effectively ban apps that warn drivers of nearby police checkpoints. The move comes after members of Congress had put pressure on both Apple and Google to remove such offerings from their respective mobile app stores.

The update to Apple’s guidelines, which was posted on June 6, and verified by an Apple spokesperson, includes a new entry in Section 22: Legal requirements. The last subitem on that list, number 22.8, now reads as follows:

“Apps which contain DUI checkpoints that are not published by law enforcement agencies, or encourage and enable drunk driving, will be rejected.”

Apple’s change of heart comes more than two months after four U.S. Senators sent a letter to Google and Apple asking that DUI checkpoint apps—which include programs like Buzzed, DUI Dodger, and Fuzz Alert Pro—be removed from the iOS and Android app stores. Congress ratcheted up the pressure even further last month during a hearing on location data. While that hearing ostensibly focused on privacy issues, Senator Charles Schumer of New York used his time on the floor to ask Apple executive Bud Tribble why Apple hadn’t removed or rejected apps that help drives avoid DUI checkpoints.

Tribble, Apple’s vice president of software technology, told Schumer:

“One of the things we found is that some of these apps are actually publishing data on when and where the checkpoints are [using information] published by the police departments. In some cases, the police department actually publishes when and where they’re going to have a checkpoint… They believe that these checkpoints provide a deterrent effect.”

Apple’s updated policy singles out apps that share unpublished DUI checkpoints, but seemingly leaves wiggle-room for Apple to ban apps using public data—when that data is couched in terms of avoiding detection for driving under the influence. It seems likely that existing apps that do not follow these rules will be removed from the App Store as well.

A check of the App Store Wednesday revealed that Fuzz Alert Pro has removed all mention of DUI checkpoints from its marketing, and the app no longer offers DUI data. At this writing, however DUI Dodger and Buzzed both remain in the App Store with their more singular DUI focuses intact.

Stay tuned for additional details as they become available and above all…drive safe!